Festivals and Films

Images and the State: Graphics In China in the 1960s and '70s

From 07 Mar 2011 to 02 Jul 2011

8 March - 3 July 2011. During China's state-sponsored cultural revolution in the late 1960s a wave of new visual art work flooded China; all of it however was state-controlled and limited to officially-sanctioned styles and subject matter.

In what amounted to mass-produced propaganda, the strong designs characterised by simple graphics and bold colours went hand in hand with political slogans and images of Chairman Mao Zedong.

This exhibition comprises some of the Ashmolean's recent acquisitions and includes posters, papercuts and even matchboxes displaying a mixture of ancient motifs with popular and political culture from the time.

A curious feature is that individual signatures were discouraged strongly by authorities of the day, with collaboration, a core tenet of communism, being enforced even in the world of fine arts.

Tue-Fri 12.00-17.00 Sat 10.00-17.00 Sun 14.00-17.00